ferent opinions is the best founded. The character of the elder nations of the world, efpecially in point of fcience, is formed from a very fmall portion of the individuals which compofe them. Take a view of the state of science in thofe, who boast its highest cultivation: Their diftinguished fcholars, philofophers, and poets, compared with the vast number, which Horace calls the profanum vulgus, exhibit the unnatural fight, of now and then a tall cedar, a venerable oak, and exuberant willow, astonishing the eye at a diftance; with the deceptive appear. ance of a luxuriant foreft, but which are found, on nearer approach, to be thinly tranfperfed over an extensive heath, whofe barren foil fcarcely affords nutriment to the humble fhrubs that cover is furface. A Newton, Young, Johnfon, Pope, Addifon, Hume, Bolingbroke, and a few other literary giants at the commencement and middle of the prefent century, gave the name of great scholars, to feven million pigmies in fcience; and of an enlightened people, to a nation, the greater part of whom, were far more ignorant than the poorer and leaft informed clafs of American citizens. To draw a right conclufion, and form a juft comparison of our literary character with other nations, we must take into confideration the general diffufion of knowledge, among every clafs of people, and the peculiar genius of American fcience. In moft coun. tries, fcience, wealth and honours, are engroffed by a comparative few. With us, not only our habits, manners, and laws, but our literature, partake of the fpirit of republicanifm; and lead, as far as the order of things, and the nature of man will permit, to an equal diftribution of honours, wealth, and knowledge. Whatever ignorance may have conceived, or prejudice afferted, Americans are not more diftinguifhed for avarice, and low arts in purfuit of gain, than by a laudable thirst, and noble emulation for the acquirement of the greatest ornament of art, and the higheft perfection of nature, a good edu cation, Nor have they honoured themfelves more by that perfevering fpirit of industry, and unbounded enterprize, which within two centuries, has changed a continent, from a wild foreft, to a cultivated field; adorned its fhores with numerous feaports, and enriched its States with an extenfive commerce to every part of the world; than by an equally rapid improvement in the useful arts, and a landable attention to private and public inftitutions for cultivating the mind, and diffufing knowledge among every class of citizens. Perhaps no country on the face of the earth can boaft of a larger proportion of inhabitants, verfed in the rudiments of science, or fewer, who are not able to read and write their names, than the United States of America. This general diftribution of useful knowļedge and competency, flared by almost every individual, is the beft fecurity of moral virtue; the strongeft tie of focial order, and the firmeft pillar of a republican gov ernment. Yet this fair and honourable trait of our national character, has been entirely overlooked by for eign and domeftic pedants, who view every thing with a malignant eye, that does not flatter their own vanity; and think every thing out of joint, that does not bend to their own wishes. The literary epicure, having no relifh for our fimple and nutritive fare, has turned away difgufted, because we have not fpread before him the luxuries of learning. And the ignorant dolt, having neither appetite nor digestion, has never learned how to appreciate that wholesome, common food which nourishes and invigorates, without furfeiting, the mind of every American, and is the fairest production and nobleft ornament of our country. In Europe, the mode and means of education tend to partial perfection; ours to general improvement. Their fcience, unequally diftributed as it is, may be compared to the expanfe of heaven; difplaying now and then a dazzling meteor, but covered with a vapour, which hides the numerous fears of inferiour order: while the comparative few, of the first magnitude, appear more confpicuous from the mift which furrounds them. Ours is the clear hemifphere of a ferene night, exhibiting in all its parts, stars of various magnitudes, diffufing their beams in every direction, without a fun to eclipfe their glory; a cloud to veil their mild luftre; or a comet to dart its baleful fires. THE WANDERER, In nova fert animus mutatas dicere formas Of bodies changed to various forms I fing. I HAVE been always pleafed In the last century, the education of women, whether proceed OVID. DRYDEN. ing from barbarity or policy, was fuch as fcarcely to entitle them to the character of rational beings. Writing and reading were qualifications refpectable from their rarity; but the Arts and Sciences were thought objects fo much beyond the reach of their intellects, that it was thought prefumptuous in a female even to name them. The few fhining exceptions that were fortunate enough to burst through the barriers of prejudice, could not boast of exciting either admiration or esteem, but were rather looked upon as lufus naturæ; as a warning rather than an exam ple. ple. It is obfervable, that at this period female excellence was fuppofed entirely to confift in managing the affairs of the kitchen. A lady knew of an admirable receipt to make Marmalade, but perhaps could not spell the words of which it was compofed; and could fet an excellent dinner on the table, when the vulgarity of her converfation rendered her unfit for fitting at the head of it. The needle was the ceafelefs inftrument employed by that hand, which now wields the pen; books (if we except The Family Phyfcian, The Complete Houfe-Keeper, and a few more of a fimilar tendency) were held in abhorrence, as ftopping the labours of the needle or the wheel, and filling their heads with idle nonsense. Love, that natural paffion of the heart, was bound in severe fubjection; "his weapons blunted, and extinct his fires.' "" The lover paffed through a probation little fhort of the fufferings of the renowned Oroondates. The lady, with every look and motion watched, was thought a mere child till five-and-twenty, and the fighing fwain made his approaches with all the tardiness and regularity of a fiege. This era of female manners, when defpotic man lorded it over the suffering fex; when women were taught every thing that could make them menially useful, and nothing that could make them rationally agreeable, and duty was the only leffon enforced, may properly be denominated the Iron Age of the female fex. In procefs of time this quakerlike ftiffness abated; women were weary of acting the part of fervants, and men found that a wife might be very dutiful and very dull. They now, in a fecret manner, mingled with the pleafures of the town; they frequent-ed plays, where it had hitherto been confidered infamous for women to be feen, but cautiously made their appearance muffled up and concealed in a hood and mafk. They ventured to walk out, attended by their maid, and would even appoint a lover in fome retired part of St. James's park. Love affailed their willing hearts in ferenades and poems; their moft trivial actions were magnified in hyperbolical poetry, and the humble fuitor taught his mistress to believe that her frowns killed, and her fmiles revived him. This was the Silver Age of woman. The tuneful tribe dignified while they celebrated the beauty of the other sex, who on their part found modefty the most effectual female charm. The artlefs felt, and the hypocritical feigned it. The Age of Iron and the Age of Silver having each for a while reigned in this our changeable kingdom, it was thought advifeable by thofe mighty though fecret beings who mould female fashions, that a third race of beings fhould give the law to fociety. They at first had fome thoughts of reviving the Iron Age or Age of Duty, but it was difcovered that the trouble and renewed fubjection attendant on fuch a feheme, would more than counterbalance the fame which its novelty would be calculated to produce. It was found that women had so long been unaccustomed to the "muzzle of reftraint," that any new attempt to reduce them to obedience could only be followed by difafter and' defeat. defeat. The beauties of Bondstreet took alarm at the bare mention of the idea, and Lady Lucy Termagant declared with fomething very like an oath, that fhe would fooner die outright, than fuffer her infignificant hufband to affume the reins of government, after having detained him in fubjection upwards of fifteen years. The Age of Silver, or, to fpeak without a metaphor, the Age of Pleafure, had continued long enough; and befides, women of an exalted turn of mind were weary of being either the dolls or the flaves of men; they felt the energies of man beat in their bofoms; they vented their complaints at firft in duodecimo fighs, and afterwards in quarto upbraidings. Their fentiments affumed a martial form; many even afpired to the Senate, and the exploits of Semiramis and Thaleftris were no longer reckoned fabulous. It had formerly been the fashion for a lady to faint at fight of a mouse or a fpider, and to court the protec tion of the other fex by throwing herfelf upon it it had alfo been cuftomary to confider a blufh as the greatest ornament of the female cheek; but the very reverse of this is the cafe at prefent. A fashionable fair one of the prefent day, fo far from courting the protection of man, takes fome young fellow under her protection, in order to bring him out, as the phrafe is; affumes the air and manners of a martial hero; laughs and talks at the opera louder than the performers; toffes her head, and exhibits her ancle with as much fang froid as any of the figuranti on the ftage: Dauntless her air, her gefture proud, And mafculine her ride. This third race of beings are in full bloffom at the prefent period, and as the first clafs was called the Iron Age, or the Age of Duty; the fecond, the Silver Age, or Age of Pleafure; fo we may denominate the third, the Brazen Age, or Age of Rights. We fhall prefently fee that this latter appellation is by no means improper. We will here paufe for a moment, and reflect on the progrefs which the female fex has gradually made in what fome people are pleafed to call civilization. They at firft, as we have obferved, adhered to their Duties; afterwards, as duty became irkfome, they fastened on their Pleasures; and now, on a fudden, a formidable fair has started up, and profeffed to teach her fex their Rights. The Rights of Man had already been tried with confiderable fuccefs among the refufe of male fociety, and the who professed to teach the Rights of Woman, was fure of finding an audience equally numerous and select among her owa fex. The hint ran like wildfire through the nation; complimentary verfes and mellifluous fonnets dropped from the pens of the minor poets, girls quitted their famplers, houfemaids threw afide the untwirled mop, and nothing refounded from fhore to fhore but Mary and the Rights of Woman. This third fect, I am forry to obferve, daily increafes in the number of its partizans; the higher ranks teen with these independent amazons, who take a box at at the theatre in their own name, and drive to the opera without even a boy chaperon to fave appearances. They will even ride on Sundays in Hyde-Park unefcorted, and familiarly nod to their male or female acquaintance with as much affurance as if they were performing a meritorious action. In literature they wade through every novel that Leader-hall-street produces, because they are determined to read every thing as it comes out, in defiance of the repeated fhocks which morals, modefty, and fenfe must receive from fuch productions. I had proceeded thus far with my Lectures, when the entrance of Benignus into my apartment caufed me to lay down my pen, at the very moment when inability to proceed was about to have the fame effect. I stated my fituation to him without reserve, and confeffed that having fet out with an intention to create four Ages, I had illuftrated three of them to my entire fatisfaction, but felt my felf fomewhat puzzled about the fourth. He fmiled at my dilemma, and, feizing the pen I had thrown afide, produced the following conclufion to this Effay: The all-wife Author of the univerfe has fo difpofed it, that real good frequently proceeds from apparent evil; the lightning that "rends the knotted oak," gives new vigour to the atmosphere, and the ftorm which beats on the head of the weary traveller imparts fertility to the earth. In like manner, the ftorms of faction have been known to ftrengthen and ameliorate Governments, by pointing out their errors, changing their administrations, and roufing their flumbering energies. If fuch be the cafe in the natural and political, may we not conclude that the moral world is bound by the same law; and that a fourth Age is not far diftant, which moralifts fhall hail as a new and glorious epoch in female manners, under the denomination of the Golden Age, or Age of Virtue? When the rigour of duty, the dalliance of pleasure, the bold display of philofophic rights, shall not fingly and exclufively ufurp the female mind, but fhall each be cleanfed from its impurities, and be infenfibly mingled in one golden stream of Humility, Modefty, and Wifdom. |